Orbán’s grip on power, which he has exercised since 2010, is weakening, even as the political stakes rise. Hungarians, and capitals across Europe, are asking how far he will go to protect his hold on power.
The mounting opposition to Orbán’s rule became clear in June, when 250,000 people flooded the streets of Budapest to join Pride celebrations in defiance of a government ban.
It was the largest demonstration Hungary had seen in years and a massive act of civil disobedience. True, the protest underlined the largely urban nature of the anti-Orbán opposition, but its sheer scale indicated growing popular frustration. It highlighted one other important thing that may prove critical in the unfolding story — the Hungarian premier, unlike some of his illiberal allies in places like Georgia, cannot easily turn to violence to repress dissent.
Not only does he lack the necessary support from the police and other state organizations that might use violence against the people, but non-violence has been a legitimizing factor for his rule. By upholding non-violent “soft power” as a means of measures of control, Orbán demonstrated stability and order, and has maintained the pretense of a “democratic” system. However, if he breaks that boundary by using force, his party would risk hemorrhaging support.
The prime minister has other problems too. His popular opponent, Péter Magyar, seeks to draw support from Orbán’s traditionalist rural heartlands. He leads in polls partly because he wins wide appeal (he did not appear at the Pride festival, for example, and is careful not to seem overly liberal on a range of issues).
While Orbán declares he is building an illiberal state, his politics include the acceptance of elective, representative government. This remains central to his approach and is essential as evidence that he and his Fidesz party answer to the people. And it’s hard to argue otherwise — he won 53% of the popular vote on a high turnout in 2022, a result Orbán declared as “big enough to see from the Moon… and Brussels.”
And yet, Hungarian illiberalism creates democracy with a different face. Fidesz has used its constitutional majority to manipulate institutions and significantly reorder media, business, and political rules in its favor. It has also amended election laws more than 30 times since 2011 to paralyze opponents and confuse voters.
But with Magyar now ahead in the polls, there must be a risk that even a skewed system (Freedom House described the 2022 elections as “severely flawed”) will fail to deliver for Orbán.
Aware of the risk, the premier is now doubling down on efforts to control dissent. One method of control has included the degradation of independent media through financial and legal threats.
Fidesz now describes a world filled with enemies, including “communists”, “globalist liberals”, and “migrants”. Due to Hungary’s close ties with Russia, Ukraine, and its President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, have been portrayed as a threat to Hungary’s national sovereignty to increase opposition to Ukrainian EU membership.
While such campaigns have found success in the past, they have been unable to halt Fidesz’s eroding popularity among Hungarian voters this time.
Declining public services, rising economic hardship, mounting sovereign debt, rampant corruption (Hungary has been the EU’s most corrupt country for three years running), as well as seemingly endless conflict with the EU and Hungary’s main European allies, have led growing numbers of Hungarians to lose faith in Orbán’s system.
Magyar and his Tisza party look likely to threaten Fidesz’s supermajority in April. Vox Populi, which compiles polling institute data, showed Tisza in the lead in September by anything from 4% to 14%, leaving Orbán and his party in an uncomfortable position just seven months before voting.
Orban will have to navigate uncharted territory to win an election that threatens his power in Hungary and thus his influence in European politics, both cultivated through autocratic and opportunist transactional politics.
There are signs he is preparing for a brutal campaign. He replaced András Gyürk, his chief campaign director, who had served him since 2004, with his political director, Balázs Orbán (not related), who has a reputation for having close contact with US Republican circles.
In past elections, Arthur Finkelstein and George Birnbaum carried out polling and oversaw Fidesz’s campaigning. Orbán is now collaborating with a new generation of “Finkelstein” strategists, including Donald Trump’s pollster John McLaughlin, and aims to tap into the latest campaign techniques used in the US presidential election .
Orbán has vast institutional, financial, and political power, but all the advantages of electoral engineering, massive financial resources, and campaign technology may not be enough to confront the challenges of the upcoming election.
The government will also deploy the tried and tested technique of spending splurges to convince the electorate to stay loyal. His government is distributing massive welfare payments despite soaring debt. At the same time, Fidesz is threatening deeper institutional repression of civil society organizations and independent media by submitting a new bill which would allow for the blacklisting, imposition of financial restrictions, and potential closure of media outlets and civil society organizations receiving foreign funds. Fidesz has also embarked on an incessant smear campaign against Ukraine and Tisza.
With its prime minister backed into a corner, Hungary faces a bitter campaign. And still the big question lingers — if he does lose, will Orbán hand over the keys to his office or launch a new campaign to claim the vote has been unfair?
Sasha Magnani is a Democratic Resilience Intern.
Zsuzsanna Szelényi is Director at the CEU Democracy Institute and a former Hungarian MP. She is the author of ‘Tainted Democracy, Viktor Orbán and the Subversion of Hungary” and is a Senior Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA).
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.
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